Former RUC Chief Constable Sir Ronnie Flanagan has said he was unaware that Special Branch officers kept files on murdered solicitor Rosemary Nelson.
He was giving evidence to the inquiry into the murder of Mrs Nelson, who was killed in a loyalist car bomb attack in 1999, amid allegations of security force collusion.
The inquiry was told that evidence had shown that Mrs Nelson had a Special Branch number, signifying the existence of files on her.
But Sir Ronnie Flanagan said he had no personal reason to understand that there would be any material that would make appropriate the creation of such a file.
The former police chief said 'My impression at the time was that Rosemary Nelson was a lawyer doing her job.'
The inquiry, which began last April, is investigating claims of security force involvement in her death in 1999.
Ms Nelson was a well-known solicitor with some high-profile republican clients.
Nelson died in loyalist bombing
She also acted on behalf of the Garvaghy Road Residents' Association during the Drumcree stand-off.
The inquiry into her murder is being held in the same building as that of another of her clients, Robert Hamill, the young Catholic man who died after being attacked by a loyalist mob in Portadown in 1997.
The mother-of-three died in a loyalist car bomb attack at her Lurgan home two years later.
Prior to her death, she had claimed that the RUC had made threats against her via her republican clients.
The inquiry is investigating those allegations as well as establishing whether the RUC knew of the loyalist threat to her and the subsequent police investigation into her murder.
Mr Flanagan, who was Chief Constable of the RUC at the time, is currently head of the British police watchdog.
He is scheduled to appear before the inquiry in Belfast for the next three days.
